Stock-chute



2 Sheets-Shet 1.

(No Model.)

W. HESS.

STOCK UHUTE.

Patented July 5, 188 7.

Wiznesses:

enior 2 Sheets-Sheet 2.

(No Model.)

W. HESS.

STOCK GHUTE.

Patented July 5, 1887.

Mines 6 66.

Nv PETERS, PMIc-Lilhugmpher. Washinglon, D4 C PATENT Enron.

Y'VILLIAM HESS, OF SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS.

STOCK-CHUTE.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters. Patent No. 365,998, dated July 5, 1887.

(No model.)

To all whom ihmay concern.-

Be it known that I, WILLIAM I-IEss, a citizen of the United States, residing at San Antonio, in the county of Bexar and State of Texas, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Stock Chutes; and I do hereby declare the following to be a full, clear, and exact description of the invention, such as will enable others skilled in the art to which it appertains to make and use the same.

In the accompanying drawings, Figure 1 is a side elevation of myimproved stoclochute, the same being shown in position contiguous to the body of a railroad-car, (shown in central cross-section) said chute being in its normal condition preparatory to operating the same either for loading or unloading the car. Fig.

.2 is a central longitudinal section of the same,

showing the operating parts of my improved stock-chute thrown into proper contiguous position to a railroad-oar, (represented in half view,) for either loading or unloading cattle from said car, the body portion of the latter being represented in central cross section, while the parts below, consisting of the truck, car-wheel, railroad rail, and cross-tie, are either in sectional view or elevation. Fig. 3 is a detached View showing the swinging apronframe of my improved-cattle-chute for transferring stock from the apron-chute floor to the car, or vice versa. Fig. 4 represents in elevation the construction of the front and rear upright pieces of the cattle-chute gates. Fig. 5 is a detached perspective view of the semirotating lever used for forcing forward the swinging apron-frame from its position when not in action, as in Fig. 1, to its working position, as in Fig. 2, in con'tiguity with a cattlecar, and locking it in such position. Fig. 6 is a reduced sectional view below the top of the car-door and showing the swinging apron or platform thrown into position for transferring cattle either into or from the car, Fig. 7 is a plan view of the floor of the cattle-chute, and Fig. 8 is a sectional diagram showing a mode of increasing the height of the front portion of the apron a when necessary.

In the figures, A indicates a foundation for my improvedcattlechute, the same being made to occupy a permanently-fixed position at some point of a yard for herding cattle which is near enough to a railroad track for will require less work and fewer laborers to operate it, but will afford a perfectly safe means of transferring stock without liability of injury to the stock during the act of transfer.

Permanently fixed upon the foundation A are front and rear beams, to a, and side beams, a and fixedly attached to and projecting upward therefrom are heavystout upright posts, as a a which at their lower ends are tenoned into the side beams, a, and firmly held in place by side braces, as at a a. At the rear of the cattle-chute, and framed to beams a a as shown, are rear posts, I) b, which respectively stand in line with the front posts, a and a, and to which rear and front posts the side rails of the cattle-chute, as c c, are attached, as shown, said posts I) b at their top being held in position with the posts a a by top braces, as c 0. Thus constructed a gangway is formed for the cattle'chute,through which cattle are passed either from the cattlecar to the cattle-yard, or vice versa, and is supplied with a fixed floor, as B, between said posts, as shown, and provided with crosscleats, as d, to assist cattle in passing through the gangway, two of the cross-cleats, as d d, having enlarged perforated central portions, (Z for a purpose which will be hereinafter explained.

In Fig. 3 in detached view I have clearly shown a pendent swinging apron-frame, O, to which, atits front portion, is a fixed apron, e, as shown, and at its rearportion a hinged apron, e, the hinges fof which are made to contiguously connect the two aprons in any suitable manner, so that when the frame (J is projected bodily forward from its position shown in Fig. 1 to its positionin Fig. 2 the consequent upward and forward movement of the apron 6 will be allowed without restriction or bind to move freely from the one position to the other, while the hinged apron 0 will also, without binding, freely move over and upon that part of the fixed floor B contiguous thereto and beneath it. Both of these aprons may be provided with cross-cleats the same as (1 upon the upper surface of the fixed floor B of the gangway, and for the same purpose.

As signified in Fig. 3, the swinging apronframe 0, carrying the fixedly-attached apron 6 and the hinged movable apron 6, consists in the main of heavy stout timbers, as gg, connected at top by a cross-beam, g, and fastened together by metal straps h h and braces h h, as shown, the cross-beam g at its outer ends being reduced, so as to form properjournals, Mto engage injournal-bearings i, (one of which is not shown in the figures,) bored through the top of the main posts a a whereby the frame 0, when in position, as in Figs. 1 and 2, becomes a pendent swinging frame, carrying the fixedly-attached swinging apron e and the flexibly moving or hinged apron c.

To provide for operating the swinging frame 0 with its aprons e c, I apply a semi-rotating cam-lever locking device, D, immediately in rear of the timbers g 9, said locking device being provided with cam-arms m m, fixedly applied to a cam-shaft, m, from either side of which extend lever-arms,asm m", provided at their ends with rings 1", to which to apply the end of a rope to operate the locking device D in opposite directions,-as will be presently described. The locking device D is at either end of its shaft m provided withjournals jj,which are properly secured in bearings j (one of whichonly is shown in Fig. 1) and applied to the side beams, a, of the chute. WVhen this cam-lever locking device D is in position, as signified in Fig. 1, and the apron-frame G is in normal inoperative position, as shown in said figure, the cam-arms m m and leverarms m m will be in a nearly-vertical position, as shown, and ready to be operated by the rope r,which rope is attached to the ringm on the end of the lever-arm W. This rope 1", as shown in the figures, passes up through the fixed door 13 and through the aperture in the enlarged portion (1 of the crossf-cleat d, and at its upper end h as a ring attached,whereby such end may be held from slipping back through said floor. This ring may be seated down into a circular groove made to fit the ring in the floor 13, so that the tread ofthe cattle will not disturb it when passing along on the floor, but which will be accessible to the operator when it becomes necessary to operate the frame 0.

As signified in Fig. 2, the frame 0 may be provided at its lower portion with crossbraces, as g" g? g, the middle one, 9 of which is longitudinally provided with a screw-rod, t, having nuts t, the nuts being made to screw up against the timbers g g, as indicated in the figures, and so help to hold said timbers in position. The cam-lever locking device D, when ready to be operated to throw the. frame 0 from its position in Fig. 1 to its position in Fig. 2, will have a portion of the curved surfaces 10 w of the cam-arms m m in contact with the rear surface of the timbers g gat thelower end of said timbers, and the operator, by pulling upon the rope T, will, by a partial rotation of the cam-lever locking device D, force the swinging frame 0 outward into the position shown in Fig. 2 against a cattle-car when ready to have cattle transferred into it from the cattle-yard, and in which position the device D becomes locked by its lever-arm in firmly impinging against the rear beam, a, upon the foundation A, as shown in Fig. 1. If, for example, cattle have been transferred into the car L through my improved cattlechute, the operator will then pull upon the rope 9, thus releasing the cam-lever locking device D from contact with the timbers g gand a, whereupon the frame 0 by its own gravity will swing back to its normal position, as in Fig. 1.

As seen in Figs. 1 and 2, E E are gates applied, respectively, to the timbers g g of the frame 0. These gates are constructed wider at top than bottom, as shown, in order to make their outer edges occupy a vertical line corresponding with the vertical line of thefcar-bod y, against which they closely abut when in position, as in Fig. 2, and thus afford no opening for the escape of animals being transferred to or from the car. Extra cross-bars, as at y, may be supplied to these gates, to prevent the escape of small animals when being transferred. The fixedly-attached apron c, it will be seen, expands outwardly on each side as it projects forward of the timbers g g, to which it is attached, so that its forward portion is Very much wider than its rearward portion, as clearly seen in Figs. 3 and 6, and hence, if the car-body L (indicated in Fig. 6) should in stopping have its door 1? almost, if not quite, past the central dotted line, 00 w, of the apron 0, still ample room will be afforded for transferring cattle and other animals from off the apron into the car L, the gates E E occupying the position shown in Fig. 6 while such transfer is being made. WVhen the transfer of animals from the cattle-yard to a cattle-car is not being made, the gates E E may be closed, one of them overlapping the other in part when in closed position.

In Fig. 1 thedottedlines y y indicate the travel of the swinging frame 0 from its position in Fig. 1 to its position shown in Fig. 2. In the plan View, Fig. 6, the running boards 0, (one of which is shown in Fig. 1,) employed to support adriver tourge the cattle forward, are omitted. In Figs. 1 and 2 the hinged apron e is represented in part as resting upon the cleats d of the fixed floor B. I, however, contemplate to allow 0 to move upon theflat even upper .surface of the floor B, the cleats upon which it rests, as shown in said figures, being removed.

It will be seen that when my improved chute is in operation, as indicated in Fig. 2, the downward pressure upon the pendent swinging apron-frame O is transferred to and against the cam-lever locking device D with a downward action or pressure upon the cam-arms m m, thereby causing the lever-arm m of the ITO cam-lever to press with an upward impingement against the rear beam, a, and hence safely lock said apron-frame O securely in position for the passage of animals through the chute. I am thus enabled to load a car and close the car-door without moving the chute from its position shown in Fig. 2, whereas with other chutes it takes two men to throw the ordinary apron upon which the cattle pass into the car, while a third man has to close the door, and it often happens that while such apron remains projected upon the floor of the car the cattle tear their hoofs and cripple themselves by' getting their feet between the apronand the car-floor, thus entailing heavy damages upon railroads. By my invention all these objections to the ordinary chute are avoided, while at the same time a single boy can operate it.

It will also be seen that the principle of operation of my improved cattle-chute c011- sists in locking the pendent swinging apron frame in operating position by thesamenleans which throws it into action,and that when unlocked it automaticallyswings back from the car into its normal position out of action, as signified in Fig. 1, and this feature of my in vention I believe to be broadly new.

As cattlecars are not always of the same height, it sometimes happens that when the swinging frame 0 is thrown into position for use, as shown in Fig. 2, its fixed apron 0 will be some six or eight inches below the floor of the ear. To remedy this, boards may be piled up across the front end of the apron, as indicated in seetioniu Fig. 8, the bottom one, 0, being nailed in fixed position to the apron 6, while the superimposed boards 6 6 may be held firmly in place by a bolt passed through all three of the boards and the apron c, as shown, and when not in use the bolt 6 may be withdrawn and the boards a and e thrown back upon the apron e, as indicated in dotted lines, the hinging of the boards together, as indicated by black dots, being such as to permit this to be done.

What I claim as my invention isi 1. A cattle-chute provided with an apronframe suspended by its upper end to the framework of the chute by an auxiliary connection, on which it swings, substantially as and for the purpose described.

2. The combination, with the frame-work of the cattle-chute, and with the stationary portion of its platform, and with the locking device I), attached to the said frame-work, of

a swinging frame, 0, provided with platformsections 6 e, the rear one of which is hinged, said frame being suspended on the frame-work of the chute by its upper end on axial connections, on which it swings, substantially as described.

3. A cattle-chute provided with an apron, e, wider at its front than its rear, in combination with gates E E, hung on vertical hinges, whereby animals may pass from the aproninto a car although the door of the cattle-car may have passed or nearly passed the center line, :0 00, of the apron, substantially as described.

' 4. A cattlechute provided with gates, as E E, hung on vertical hinges and made Wider at top than at bottom, in order to incline and overhang the platform 6, as described, and at their outer edge to closely adjoin the car when the cattle-chute is in use, substantiallly as described.

5. The cattle-chute gangway forming a coir nection between a drove-yard and transportation-cars of railways, said chute being provided with a platform comprising a rear stationary part, an intermediate hinged part, and a suspended self-closing vibrating forward part, and devices, as described, for moving outward the suspended vibrating part and the part hinged to it and locking the same in proper relative position to the ear, substantially as described.

6. The combination of gates which are flared upward from their bases with a cattle-chute forming a connection between a drove-yard and transportation-ears of railways, said chute comprising a platform consisting of a rear stationary part, an intermediate hinged part, a flaring suspended vibratingself closing part, and devices for moving outward the suspended vibrating part and the part hinged to it and locking thesame in position, substantially as described.

7. The cattle-chute having its platform made with a stationary, a hinged, and a swinging section, the hinged and swinging sections being attached to a frame suspended upon an axial connection near the top of the main supporting frame-work of the chute, on which it swings, substantially as and for the purpose described.

In testimony whereof I afiix my signature in presence of two witnesses.

\VILLIAM HESS.

Witnesses:

J AMES NELSON, PETER U. ROTHENFLUE. 

